> Nothing stopped people from enjoying hiking 50 years ago with bad gea
we can't prove it's the gear, and it is likely not to be the dominant factor, but vastly more people do in fact participate in this sor of activity today than they did 50 years, so i would argue that actually, gear did play a role in "stopping people from enjoying hiking". Not "all people", but some people.
however, i feel that you're overly focused on the details of my examples. i could have picked dozens of hundreds of examples of where the things we have available today (where notable convergence in design has occured) are just better. i don't feel that you've answered my question about you would differentiate the two processes, and instead have tried to use the "outdoor gear" example as a way to simply come up with a reiteration of your initial claim.
but convergence can also just be ... convergence. People can actually agree that there's a better/best way to do something independent of other motivations.
we can't prove it's the gear, and it is likely not to be the dominant factor, but vastly more people do in fact participate in this sor of activity today than they did 50 years, so i would argue that actually, gear did play a role in "stopping people from enjoying hiking". Not "all people", but some people.
however, i feel that you're overly focused on the details of my examples. i could have picked dozens of hundreds of examples of where the things we have available today (where notable convergence in design has occured) are just better. i don't feel that you've answered my question about you would differentiate the two processes, and instead have tried to use the "outdoor gear" example as a way to simply come up with a reiteration of your initial claim.